Our Electrifying Car Experiences

 

• A published Aug. 25, 2022 in the South Boston (VA) News & Record
• By Mike Doan
  

You don’t see many Teslas in Halifax County. “What do you like about it?” I get asked at the Food Lion parking lot in South Boston. “Is it really cheaper than using gasoline?” I’m asked at a church gathering.

We bought a Nissan Leaf electric car first after Tesla installed chargers at no cost to our bed & breakfast because there were so few chargers in the area. Let’s get an electric car too, we decided. They’ll definitely reduce our carbon footprint and save on gas, too.

The Leaf was a great start, but it could only run about 110 miles on a charge. Twice we ran out of fuel when we got lost on a trip. Once it was at a gas station, quite embarrassing! A tow truck had to rescue us. And when there were fewer than 10 miles left on a charge, the car’s speaker system would start screaming at us and we would go into a panic until we found a charger. 

We’ve had better luck for our longer trips with our Tesla 3 (Standard Range +), which can go up to 220 miles on a charge, though long range Teslas can go 315 miles. The car cost us about $40,000 in 2022, about the average price for a new car. (Next year buyers can get a $7,500 tax credit). We can plug it in at home and when traveling recharge it at a supercharger, which can fill it up in half an hour for $15 to $20. That’s about 5-10 cents a mile when away from home, compared to about 15 cents for a gasoline vehicle. However, if you plug the car in to a socket at home, you’ll save more.

So what do we like? The acceleration is amazing. The ride is smooth and quiet. You can warm up the car in winter from home with a app. Your phone controls the door locks. The sound system is awesome. Pedestrians walking in front of us set off an alarm. You can follow another car in heavy traffic and the car will slow down and speed up automatically. Voice commands can tell the A/C to ramp up or the GPS to take you home. There’s the “dog mode,” which can keep the A/C on if you briefly leave the dog in the car and tells concerned onlookers on the screen not to worry! Other automakers are starting to catch up with these innovations.

Then there is an auto-pilot feature that keeps the car from moving out of its lane. I don’t use it because it tends to make me sleepy!  If we had spent more on the ‘full self driving option’, we could have gotten it to stop at stoplights and pick us up in a parking lot.

There is virtually no maintenance required—except for rotating the tires and filling the wiper fluid. The car doesn’t become outdated because features are updated regularly via wi-fi signals sent by the manufacturer.

The big screen on the dashboard can be confusing. The first time my wife Pickett drove the car, it rained and she couldn’t figure out how to start the windshield wipers, which did not turn on when they are supposed to when the window gets wet.

Perhaps the most fun moment came when a local friend asked if his 12-year-old nephew could interview me for a class paper he was writing about Teslas. I let the boy ride with me, and he was totally awestruck by everything about it. Afterward, he wrote me a thank-you note, indicating it was one of the high points of his young life. Awww!

 

 

 

Who Needs an Office? Newcomers Love it Here

 

Look for more people from urban areas to move to Halifax County, where folks are friendly, traffic is light and housing is inexpensive. Guests at Oak Grove Bed & Breakfast who are seeking property say they can work from home and don’t have to commute long distances to work in crowded offices.

 

One couple threw a dart at a map and somehow ended up in Cluster Springs. “We wanted to get out of Miami and live a simpler lifestyle,” says Alejandra Martinez. “So we took a road trip, got a realtor and the rest is history!” She and husband Francisco and son Frankie stayed at the B&B before settling on a house a half mile from us.. “What I love is the freedom we have,” she says.. “We can practically start work at any time and end any time.” Our son is home schooled and he has the same freedom.” Francisco is an engineer who designs solar panels for a company in the West. She works as a virtual administrative assistant under  CEOs from Texas, New Jersey, Arizona and India.  She blended in fast and sang at Constitution Square just before the July 4 fireworks.

 

Ray Weiss and Susan Black moved from northern Virginia to Halifax in 2020 during the pandemic. “We don't have to worry about going back into an office and we are very happy about that,” Weiss says. “We started volunteering at the Prizery this year because we would go to events there and thought it would be fun to help out. We love it here in Halifax and at the Prizery

 

Keith Washo came to Halifax from the Raleigh, mainly because he fell in love with Chelsey Garrett, who manages the Edward Jones office in Halifax. But he could also move because his tech job with Adaptive Sound Technologies allowed him to work remotely. As a musician, he also found “Halifax County a quiet, peaceful setting for writing and composing.” Since arriving, he has offered soccer camps via the YMCA and music shows and a song-writing class at The Prizery.

 

Brittny Valdes calls her move to Halifax County “a match made in heaven.” A native of the Miami area, she worked with her friend Mark Anthony to paint a mural in the Halifax Farmers Market. Soon she landed her current job as box office manager for The Prizery and occasionally freelances for the News & Record. “This community has accepted and supported me since day one,” she says. “I It’s changed my life and made it better.”

 

Two of our other guests who found a home here were Loretta and Bertram Cuffley, who moved from Stamford, Conn.  in 2013. “We were searching for an old house between Southern Virginia and North Carolina for early retirement,” she says. “Aside from the low cost of housing and taxes, people were welcoming, and the Prizery was a bonus. The proximity to major cities was also an attraction. We love it here.”

 

Scotty Felton, realtor at Long & Foster, reports, “Since covid, some people have come here because of the ability to work from home.  The only challenges right now are a shortage of available homes and inability to get Internet in some areas. That could change with new efforts to extend Wi-Fi coverage in rural areas.

 

Persistence Pays Off for Diva

 

 

News of Kelly Glyptis’ starring role in London brings back wonderful memories of my six seasons as a local in Prizery Summer Theater musicals.

 

Long before she landed her treasured role as Carlotta in Phantom of the Opera, on Aug. 1, she had been a mainstay in The Prizery’s summer stock productions from 2016 to 2018 while not on tour with opera companies.

 

Her director, Chris Jones, told me: “I first met Kelly when the Virginia Opera came to The Prizery. After the performance, I took the company to Bistro 1888 for a late dinner! We bonded immediately and went on and on about our Summer Theater. Kelly was impressed. So when I called and offered her a job she immediately said yes!”

 

In one production with her, I particularly remember her marvelous rendition of “You’ll Never Walk Alone,” in Carousel. One advantage of being in those shows is getting to hear something like that in performance and rehearsal about 20 times.

 

In “Into the Woods,” her song “Last Midnight,” as the witch, was a cue for me to get on stage as the Mysterious Man for my duet “No More,” with the Baker.

 

Kelly wasn’t just a singer and actress. She was licensed as a fight choreographer, though she sure didn’t look like a fighter!  Once she was assigned to help me tumble down a flight of stairs and land on top of Jack in the Beanstalk without getting hurt. After a few tries, I got really grumpy and told her to forget it. I mean, I was 75 years old! The last thing I wanted to do was fall down the stairs! She took it gracefully.

 

There were so many other memories: Katie Holland’s parents showing up at every performance in which she danced. Evan and Lydia Snead blossoming on stage. Jacob Waid’s magnificent “Bring Him Home” solo in Les Miserables, and two Prizery actors, Fergie L. Philippe and Tyler McKenzie, joining Hamilton on Broadway.

 

At The Prizery’s request, I pursued a story about Glyptis’s new role, though I was scooped by the News & Record’s wonderful article by Victoria Thompson! Though five hours away, Glyptis was quite responsive to my inquires over iMessenger, even answering a few questions between acts.

 

What impressed me most was her persistence with her craft. Though Summer Theater may not have advanced her opera career, her six musicals certainly gave her experience in a fairly new field for her. She wasn’t afraid to break loose and try her hand on another continent. In London, she had a great deal of success before joining the theater company of Andrew Lloyd Webber, probably the greatest living musical theater composer.

And in her role as a precocious prima donna, she got to be an opera singer—just what she set out to do in the first place.

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Moveable Feast for Hungry Dogs

 

 

If you ride bikes on the Halifax County roads, you might encounter nasty dogs. I have a few dogs of my own that wouldn’t mind scaring the daylights out of cyclists for fun, but they are too far from the road.

 

Most dogs are harmless, but what do you do when a ferocious, chasing mutt looks like it wants to put bite marks on your pants? Personally, I use a spray called “Halt” if they get too close. (As long as I don’t spray myself.) I kept it in my pocket until a boxer on Old Cluster Springs Road took a chunk out of my right leg about 10 years ago. He was quarantined for a few days and then was out on the road yapping at bikers like before. I avoided that road for years.

 

I asked other bike riders what they do about dogs. Walter Hampton, who has since moved to Front Royal, uses an electronic gadget that harmlessly jolts threatening dogs as they approach. Ray Weiss of Halifax takes his water bottle and squirts or dumps it on the dog, and I have seen it work. Bob Plapp of South Boston simply boasts, “I outrun them!”

 

Otherwise, I find the county a great place to ride, but I do it only in good light and on roads with little traffic. There are so few riders, you can set records. According to the ride tracking app Strava, I am a “local legend” for having made the “Stokes Creek Climb to Old Cluster” more than anyone in the last 90 days. Wow. I don’t even know where that is, but it sure isn’t steep.

 

I guess one group that thinks it is steep is the Hampton Roads Bicycle Club, which came to our B&B to experience the lightly traveled roads about 20 years ago. Mostly they sat around the fireplace. While it was raining lightly, many of them complained that it was too hilly here. What? Well, maybe compared to Hampton Roads! Those who actually rode ended at Breezy Oaks Farm Bed & Breakfast, where everyone stopped for a massage and decided to quit for the day.

 

I started riding here at age 57, when one of our guests invited me to go with him on our dirt trails. Who, me? Well, why not? I had already been riding an exercise bicycle, which uses the same muscles. I couldn’t keep up with him, but I was sold! Afterward, I commuted to work by bike for years in Washington, turning the worst two hours of the day into the two best.  It wasn’t all perfect. I collided with another bicyclist in front of the Treasury building and was hospitalized briefly with a concussion. I was rescued by the Secret Service! I must be important!

 

In the Cluster Springs area, I like riding on Link-Puryear Road, Old Cluster Springs Road, German Creek Road and Cherry Hill Church Road. I used to go on some great rides into North Carolina, particularly on Bethel Hill Road.

 

The biggest advance for biking around here has been the Tobacco Heritage Trail, which was expanded from 2 ½ miles to 4 miles a couple of years ago. That round trip is usually enough for me. It is well maintained and popular among our guests as well. It’s encouraging to see children on bikes, a good sign for the future.

And , with leashes required, you (probably) don’t have to worry about getting bitten by a dog.

 

 

An Innkeeper? How Did That Happen?

 

“You want to start a what?” I asked Pickett in amazement.

 

“A bed and breakfast. It would be perfect for the house in Cluster Springs.

”

So began a 34-year adventure that I have enjoyed but never bargained for when I was a teenager growing up in the California suburbs.

 

I tend to stay in motels myself when I travel, but now I had the opportunity to meet all kinds of interesting people and not even have to leave home at Oak Grove Bed & Breakfast.

 

Pickett, who grew up in the 200-year-old house, loves to show it off to visitors. I am no repairman or bellhop, but I can help out with breakfast. After all, I was a PROFESSIONAL  busboy in college.

 

Most guests have been wonderful. Friends come. Families with kids. Foreign travelers. A bike rider crossing the whole state. Even business and government people who gave me good tips to write about.

But there were a few who were a real challenge.

 

One traveler lost his car keys in the Staunton River while boating. We loaned him a car to drive to Richmond, where his son delivered spare keys from Washington.

 

There was the couple who was told to stay out of the attic, where there was a school over 100 years ago. Its children had written with lampblack on the walls, and when the guests entered the attic anyway and saw it, they thought it was haunted. They left in the middle of the night without telling us. They even demanded a refund, and we even gave them some of their money back.

 

Then there was the man just a few weeks ago who called Pickett with news that someone was banging on the front door at midnight. No one was at the door, and Pickett went back to bed. It turned out that the knocker wanted to use our Tesla charger. When she reappeared at the charging port, the man called the police, and vehicles swarmed to our B&B only to see the woman charging her car.

 

Certainly the most difficult for me was the time I was asked to make breakfast when Pickett was traveling. A woman who provided a two-page list of her dietary restrictions did agree to a parmesan cheese omelet but only if the cheese was from Italy or France.  At breakfast, I spilled a glass of water on her. She didn’t complain, but her sister didn’t want her dish and asked for an alternative. I came up with French toast, which I hadn’t made in years. In her devastating online review, she wrote that it was really just fried bread. Well, she wasn’t completely wrong.

 

I was never asked to make breakfast again.

 

But these were exceptions. Almost everyone is friendly, helpful and kind.

 

 

A Tenor? Oh, No!

On a train carrying the San Francisco Opera Company cast to Los Angeles, the small child climbed on the lap of the famous singer, Salvatore Baccaloni. “So, young man,” said the accomplished vocalist, “are you going to be a tenor like your father when you grow up?” The small boy scowled back: “Nobody’s gonna make a tenor outta me!” The boy was me.

 

As a teenager, I resisted my father’s attempts to interest me in singing and in classical music. I did play piano, particularly jazz, but I did not get interested in voice until I saw my daughter Sara’s high school chorus in Arlington almost 50 years later. It was stupendous. “I want to do that,” I decided.

 

I really enjoyed a gospel chorus, but to improve my singing, I took voice lessons. My teacher, Charles Williams, told me, “You have a beautiful instrument that you have been misusing all of your life.” When I told him I was singing bass, he said, “Get out of there. You are a tenor! In fact, a first tenor.” A tenor? Oh, no!

 

I carried this newfound voice to extremes, singing solos at our Methodist church in Washington and joined some of the best choruses in the city. I auditioned on a stormy night for City Choir of Washington, where I was handed a song by possibly the city’s leading choral director, Robert Shafer. I couldn’t believe it: this was the same song we had sung at a church service the week before. After one verse, the lights went out as lightning struck. When they came back on, Shafer looked confused and said, “I guess you know what you are doing” and I was in!

 

In Southside Virginia, I have sung either in choruses or as a soloist at First Baptist, First Presbyterian, Clarksville Presbyterian, Mt. Carmel Presbyterian, Double Nickel in Clarksville, the Summer Community Chorus and in six seasons of The Prizery’s Summer Theater.

 

Still searching, I experimented with country, gospel, jazz, pop, rock, opera, Broadway and classical. I couldn’t swing like Frank or rock like Elvis. But then a big turning point came when I sang “What a Wonderful World” at Sara’s wedding seven years ago in front of our Cluster Springs home.

As I practiced the song for my teacher, he broke into tears. This happened twice! Many in the audience at the wedding cried too.

I think I found my niche.

 

You can see some of my music by searching for: “Pickett Craddock Mike Doan” on YouTube.

 

 

 

It's a Dog's Life (But Not Bad)

 

 

One reason we aren’t moving back to Arlington: Our dogs would never stand for it.

 

For years we spent only summers at our 400-acre home in Cluster Springs while living the rest of the year in a one-bedroom apartment in Arlington. When India, now 5, was a puppy, we would frantically rush to the elevator on the 10^th floor, hoping we could make it outside in time. A few times, we didn’t.

 

 Now that we have moved here permanently,  India and her 10-year-old brother Niko confront us every morning insisting on a walk. These standard poodles won’t go by themselves, and maybe that’s a good thing. We are forced to exercise, and they’ll stay away from the road.

 

Frankly, I have a love/hate relationship with dogs.  I was bitten by them first as a newspaper carrier and later as a bike rider. I never had them as a kid, but I married a dog lover (Pickett Craddock) and have a daughter, Sara, who is passionate about them. Many times she would take a stray dog home and as she teared up, I would make her give it up. Now she has four dogs in a house next door and even runs a very successful dog grooming salon there.

 

One of her dogs has caught my fancy, though. He is a big 5-year-old hound—named Ethos of all things—who won’t be bossed by anyone. He refuses to come in when called. If you let him out, he won’t come back until he is hungry. He roams the 400 acres all day and often all night, howling like the dog in Sherlock Holmes’ “The Hound of the Baskervilles.” I love it! When cooped up in apartments, he tore up a basement and enraged neighbors with his howls. But here he roams free, the way he was meant to.

 

 I don’t really have a dog. Niko and India are loyal to Pickett. Three of Sara’s dogs are beholden to her. But Ethos answers to nobody. He’s my kind of dog!

 

 

 

 

Summer Theater's Surprising Coup

 

They pulled it off! The Prizery’s Summer Theater is back, and it’s good!

Things looked bleak just a few months ago: The pandemic shut down the program for two years. Long-time director Chris Jones retired. The new director, with an ambitious agenda, suddenly left just before live auditions for actors from throughout the Southeast.

 

Newly hired Melanie Cornelison Jannotta bravely went ahead anyway with ambitious plans for A Chorus Line and Footloose through video auditions. A cast was assembled, and then…..the new staff couldn’t find enough homes in a pandemic-weary town to host all the actors and crew.

 

Undaunted, Cornelison-Jannotta scaled the staff down to 10 with a skeleton crew and a new show: “Xanadu.” The remaining cast had to learn a new musical in only a few weeks’ time.

 

 I was skeptical as I looked in on early rehearsals while helping with publicity. But I admired the upbeat attitude of these 20-somethings, who would make this show work no matter what. 

 

Well, what a surprise! At Sunday’s show, which was well attended, the music was superb as the talented Jessica Sanzone belted out hits made famous by Olivia Newton-John, sometimes on roller skates. Jonah Barricklo commanded the stage as Sonny and learned to skate just in time. Nash Dawson stood out as Danny McGuire with a great voice and amazing dance steps. Caylin Keliehor and Claire Wilson were hilarious singing “Evil Woman” and in other roles.

 

The story of a muse from Mt. Olympus falling in love with an artist on Earth comes together a lot better on stage than in the 1980 movie. Songs are richer, and “Have You Never Been Mellow” and “Don’t Walk Away” have terrific harmony.

 

Just a few quibbles: Sometimes it was hard to understand lyrics, and the sound got a little loud—but maybe it was my hearing aids. And I sure would like to see local actors back. It was what made Summer Theater so great in the six seasons that I performed in it—the mix of local youth mentored by out-of-town professionals. The kids’ parents came and bought up tickets. But this year’s production had to be put together in no time, and I’m sure that the locals will be back next year. 

 

A job well done, cast and crew!

 

There are still four shows left, Thursday through Sunday. See www.prizery.com.

 

 

Perils of Graduation

 

“Get off that sofa and find a job!” my dad told me in June of 1959.

“What? I just graduated from high school, and it is the summer before college. It’s time for a break,” I thought but didn’t dare say. What’s the matter with daytime TV?

“I want you to go up the main street and ask every store owner to hire you,” he said. When that didn’t work, I went door to door trying to sell TVs. Next, he got me a one-day job somehow picking string beans with seasoned farm workers in California’s blazing hot San Ramon Valley. I made only $2.70 and spent $1.80 of that on sodas. ­­­­He told me afterward, “You never have to do that again.”

I finally found work in San Francisco’s seedy Tenderloin District as a busboy, lodging at a fleabag hotel. I did get to see Willie Mays and the Giants play several times in their second season in San Francisco. However, the Tenderloin was no place even then for a 17-year-old boy, and my father should have forbidden it. 

As one who hopped on freight trains during the Depression, he thought it was good for me. However, a drunk climbed off a fire escape into my fifth-floor window, thinking he was locked out of his own room. I screamed for help. He was lucky I didn’t push hm to his death. I was moved to a room without a window.

For a long time, I thought my father pressured me too hard to get a job until I had an encounter 50 years later with my 20-year-old daughter. She complained that her course load in community college was too heavy. “I would like to drop from 12 units to 9 to have more time for myself,” she told me. “Fine,” I said. “You can pay me $200 a month rent.” She quickly changed her mind. Later she thanked me.

OK, Dad. You were right after all!

 

Small-Town 4th

 

No, this wasn’t the fireworks show at the Washington Monument. This was better!

 

Where else but in a small town can you drive up to a tiny place like Elmo, park a half block from the main road and watch a parade of fire engines, antique cars and people waving flags on pickup trucks? Then wander through the small crowd and find people you know?

 

Or spontaneously decide to see the Fourth of July show at Constitution Square and park easily? The grandchildren can jump in a moon bounce and run across some kids they already know.

 

And then there is a fine local band, Public Consumption, performing, and it’s easy to find a place to put your folding char. Then, a surprise: Your friend Alexandra Martinez, who stayed at your B&B before moving here a couple of years ago, is the main attraction. That wouldn’t have happened in Washington.

 

She sings a great medley of songs, some that she just learned as a fill-in performer. Then, in front of thousands of people, she singles you out by name for introducing her to “Georgia on My Mind,” which we once practiced together at my house. She improvises some lyrics: “Please move your car. It is blocking the fireworks truck” without missing a beat.

 

Soon “God Bless America” and a spectacular 15-minute fireworks show.

 

 Yes, God Bless America!